Life often hands out unexpectedly harsh consequences for seemingly trivial acts.
Consider the example of two young workers engaging in a bit of seemingly harmless horseplay at work in mid-winter. The first worker is acting like a pitcher and “pitching” a ball of rolled up gloves to a second worker who is using a length of steel pipe as a bat. As the batter swings to connect with the ball, the pipe slips from his gloved grip and is travelling straight at the pitcher. The pitcher is unaware of the object coming straight at his face, because of the early winter darkness, until it is almost upon him. Only at the last moment does the pitcher recognize the danger, but by that time it is too late.
The injured worker, in the prime of his life, will undergo multiple reconstructive surgeries; agonize for weeks about the possibility of the loss of eyesight in one eye and experience months of painful recuperation. The company investigation will seek to verify that the worker had been trained and understood company, and legal, sanctions forbidding horseplay in the workplace. Questions will be asked about appropriate supervision and ultimately whether the employer could be considered to be duly diligent.
In the final analysis, we must all understand the risks and consequences that potentially may befall us. Rules created to protect individuals will only do so if understood by workers and enforced by supervisors. When our young worker left for work that day he certainly never expected to be critically injured. Yet that is a risk we all face and it is those risks we must all work to reduce and control.
